by Zoe Chant
He could look back down that long road with no pain, and he could even smile at the memory after three times with McKenzi.
Oh, McKenzi. How could he find enough words for her? Her song was still shaping, and he knew it would be his best. Three times, each different, the last one better than both because it was long and slow and tender, under the hot clear water.
He couldn’t find the words because it would take all the words in the language. All the music he knew still wasn’t quite enough. She was a song different from all his other songs, a new melody he was still reaching to express. And when she asked him to stay, and sing, it felt like she’d given him a gift. He would give her a song in return, oh, yes, but it was still taking shape in his mind.
She had to go to her work. She kissed him there under the painted town with all the happy animals. He strummed chords as he gazed at the smiling pig behind the hotel counter, the rooster texting on his phone, a chicken skateboarding down Main Street, and a rabbit racing in a tiny car over a hill to where a cow lay mooing. There were songs here, a small song in each busy animal doing human things. . . and then it hit him.
All those animal tracks he’d sniffed that night?
This town was full of shifters.
McKenzi’s sister’s painting was a love song with brush and color to a whole community of shifters.
He walked slowly along the wall, looking at each animal, noticing what they did and with whom, and tried to find a wolf among them. He still hadn’t found one when he heard footsteps at the front door of McKenzi’s cottage. Old habit poised him to run, but then a deeper instinct kicked in, and he knew it was Rolf. The door banged open, and Rolf towed in a tall, stooping man.
“Here’s West! He’s a wolf! He helped me shift. How did you know, West? Oh, this is my dad, Lee Enkel.”
West fully expected the father to be wary, hackles up, but Lee stuck out a hand with its telltale calluses on fingers and thumb, mumbling, “Thanks for helping my boy. Had no idea . . .” He shrugged, waving a hand.
Rolf flopped on McKenzi’s couch, grinning from one to the other. “I told Dad you can play that banjo.”
West remembered what McKenzi had said, and held the banjo out. “I think this is yours?”
Lee shook his head. “No, go ahead. I parked that years ago. Don’t play anymore. Was never good enough to make a go of it.”
“Sure you were,” Rolf said, though with less certainty.
West could sense the boy’s emotions so clearly—he wanted his dad to be impressed by West, but he also wanted West to be impressed with his dad. To bridge the awkward moment, he began a Scruggs style riff, then shifted to one of his loping wolf ballads. No singing, just the music, as he watched Lee’s shoulders come down a notch, and Rolf grin with . . . pride?
Pride? The obvious hit West at that moment: he’d imprinted Rolf. Without intending anything but to help the kid shift, somehow the pack bond had come into play.
Oh, shit. Now what was he supposed to do? He had zero experience here—after all these years of running. Seeking his own pack.
He bent his head, the music turning stormy as he tried to sort through a tangle of emotions far more powerful than that storm outside. Shit, shit, shit.
Rolf’s voice interrupted him. “Do you know ‘Howl’ by Axe and the Banshees?”
West paused, shaking his head. “I don’t sing anyone else’s music. My head’s too full of my own. Sorry, kid.”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” Rolf said, and West could feel the cub in play bow, head turned anxiously up. Trying to please his . . .
I’m no alpha, West thought. But that didn’t seem to be true anymore. After a lifetime of being a lone wolf, an outsider, he was now the alpha of a pack of two. And Lee’s shifter animal was a dog without a pack of his own. Lee was watching with the anxiety of a parent as he said to his son, “So what happened this morning?”
Rolf looked ready to run, but glanced at West. Whatever he saw in West’s face seemed to settle him down, because he burst out, “It wasn’t my fault! It was that dickwad Jeff Olsen. He and his goons had Timothy Beck up against the wall, hassling him, something about Lisa Finn and the Valentine’s Day Dance.”
Lee sighed. “The Olsen kid again. Can’t you stay away from him?”
“I can’t help it! He goes around looking for trouble! And he gets away with it because his dad’s the coach.”
Lee bristled all over. “Stupid dances. Always hated ‘em, especially Valentine’s Day.”
Rolf said defensively, “LaShawna Odom asked me.”
“The sheriff’s girl?”
“Yeah,” Rolf said, preening a little. “She coulda asked anybody. But she asked me. That’s why Jeff started hassling me again, last week. I know you told me to pretend not to notice, and I tried. But that doesn’t stop it. He just keeps at it. So when I came into the restroom and saw him with Tim backed up, I slugged him. First time! Caught him totally by surprise.” He deflated a little. “Then the rest of them landed on me, but luckily Mr. Penrose came in, yelling what’s all this noise, then sent us all to the VP, and of course Jeff said it was my fault, and gave his butt-heads dirty looks, and they all said real quick that Jeff was right.”
“And Timothy?”
“Said he didn’t see anything. I don’t blame him. He’s about this tall—” Hand held out three feet off the floor. “And his voice squeaks. But the girls all think he’s cute.”
“Well, just stay away from that Olsen kid. That family is bad news,” Lee said with gloomy conviction. West, sensitive, heard an undercurrent of long-unresolved anger.
And saw Rolf typically shrug off his father’s words.
This was a situation he had no idea how to handle, so he took refuge in strumming the banjo. Lee’s expression began to lighten as West ran through some chords and then riffs. They got into a conversation about different styles of banjo playing until Rolf got impatient.
West began to play, which quieted the restless teen. He sang something he’d composed while he was still a teen, one summer in Virginia. Rolf grinned and tapped his fingers on his knees, so West gave him a series of the young wolf songs, some fun, some sad, a lot about the open road.
Lee listened with his eyes closed, gradually relaxing, but finally he glanced at his watch and got to his feet. “It’s suppertime. Your grandma won’t like it if we’re late. And afterward, you still have your homework, even though you got suspended. Especially since you got suspended.” Then he turned to West. “You’d be welcome to join us.”
“Don’t want to intrude,” West said. “I’m good.”
Lee got up to go, but Rolf still sat there in a slump on the couch. When his father began walking up toward the ranch house, the kid said, “Will you show me some more wolf things? I want to practice shifting. It kind of hurts my stomach.”
“You’ll get used to it,” West said. “Tell you what. You do that homework your dad mentioned, and we’ll take a run. And I’ll also show you some self-defense moves.”
Rolf sat bolt upright, grinning. “You will? I’ll be right back.”
The rain had let up some, stars peeking through the clouds when Rolf returned. West showed him how to roll his clothes and tuck them somewhere out of sight, then they practiced shifting. When they were both in their human shapes, Rolf asked, “Where’d you get all those scars?”
West looked down at himself, reflected in the light from the ranch house windows. “Fights, mostly.”
“Wolf or human?”
“Both.”
West thought of his scars as evidence of how many fights he’d come near to losing, but Rolf seemed to be impressed. West shifted so he wouldn’t have to talk about his past, and Rolf also shifted. Each time seemed to be a bit easier.
They ran down the hill and up along the ridge behind the town, all the way to the palisades above the ocean, then circled around again. By then, Rolf was drooping. They shifted back, dressed, and West further tired the teen out by teaching him basic stances an
d blocks in self-defense. All the while his internal clock waited for midnight and McKenzi’s return.
Presently a woman came to the door and called for Rolf.
“That’s my Aunt Doris,” he said reluctantly.
“Run,” West said and watched with amazement—and amusement—as Rolf obediently squeezed out one last spurt of energy as he ran home.
West returned to McKenzi’s cottage, and sat in a chair looking up at the mural. His eyes traveled to the little round house up on a hill, with a group of cats playing around it. Which one was McKenzi?
A rush of light and heat spun him around when the door opened, and there she was, glossy brown hair spilling over her shoulders, brown eyes wide—how could he have not known she was a cat? She moved with a lightness to her step as she came in, tossing her coat, purse and keys on a side table, and with an expression of loathing, threw the bunched-up pink apron on the floor. “How I hate that thing,” she snarled, kicking it across the room before she carefully set a battered guitar case next to the couch. “A friend’s old guitar. She said feel free to play it as long as you like.”
“Thanks.” He turned to the mural. “Which one is you?”
Her answer was to pull off her red sweater-top, slip out of her leggings, and shift. A fluffy tabby leaped up onto the coffee table, tail up, and pranced around in a circle.
Never in West’s life had a cat seemed so fascinating. He didn’t think—just shucked his clothes, shifted, and bounded around the table as the cat batted playfully at his muzzle. Then she leaped onto his back, and he tried to wrestle, but his tail sent a lamp flying, and his front paw tangled in the electrical cord to the TV, which teetered dangerously.
He shifted back, ready to apologize with real remorse, but she had shifted too, her head thrown back as she laughed with abandon. Light shone richly, enhancing the curves of her breasts, and adorning the roundness of her hip. An ache so intense it hurt seized him, but it was glorious, too. She was so beautiful as she said, “No biggie, so a lamp breaks. Everything in here is vintage garage sale. I think we’re going to have to do that again. But maybe not around electrical cords.”
She laughed again. He reached for her, and she pounced on top of him, bending her head to brush her hair teasingly over his chest.
“I thought about you all night,” she purred in a low growly voice that sent heat straight to his cock.
“I missed you,” he said.
“What did you do?”
“Taught Rolf a little stuff. Talked to Lee. Played some music. McKenzi, there’s something I need to talk out.”
“Later,” she whispered, licking his throat. “Every dinner roll I put down made me think of this.” She bit his shoulder. “And every plate of French fries made me think of this.” She nuzzled his ribs.
“Really? French fries?” He laughed in spite of the hard-on getting more insistent by the second.
She slid his hands over his buns, kneading slowly. “Want to know what made me think of these?”
“No,” he growled, flipping her over and spreading her knees wide. “Because now you’ve made me hungry.”
Seven
McKenzi
It was so perfect.
He was so perfect.
No demands. No dangerous promises, just . . . purrrrr-fect.
He teased her by gently rubbing his stubble against her inner thighs until she stretched out to the utmost. Then she gazed between the hardening peaks of her breasts and watched him looking down at her deepest places as if she were the world’s most awesome art.
And then he gently pressed a kiss at the top of her folds. She was now dripping wet, a volcano of want. Her stomach tensed with white-hot urgency as he licked and lapped and teased . . . and sucked, shooting her to impossible heights.
When she came down, he said, “I’ve got an idea.”
She sat up on her elbows, weak-limbed with after-bliss as he bent and picked up the balled apron she’d kicked against the fridge. “You brought this home to put in the laundry, right?”
“I spilled coffee down the damn thing. Unfortunately, it’s made out of indestructible synthetic.”
“So let’s try something. Put it on.”
“What?”
“You have no idea how hot you’ll look in that thing, and nothing else. And after I bang you quite thoroughly, every time you put it on, you’re gonna remember that.” He finished with that whisky voice so low her thighs quivered all over again.
She snapped the apron out of the ball, and pulled it on, coffee stains and all, and watched his eyes watching her. “Tie it tight,” he ordered.
Heat shot through her. She reached behind her, and yanked on the stupid sash. Feeling the way the bib squashed her breasts up into an extravagant cleavage.
“Now lean back on the table.”
She did, her entire body alight with expectation.
“Oh, yes,” he breathed, running his hands up her hips to the sash, and caressing the naked skin over her ribs before he outlined the ruffled edges of the heart-shaped bib, his fingers meeting at the V in the center over her cleavage.
He teased her nipples through the fabric, then pulled each breast up for a thorough laving before he sucked until she was breathless and trembling.
He slid his hands under her butt, pulled her against him and lifted. Two steps, and he had her back to the wall. She locked her ankles around his hips, bucking against him as he kneaded her butt, then worked inward. His hard-on touched her wet, aching opening, and she whimpered, her head lashing from side to side, her nails digging into his shoulder.
He fitted his cock to her and thrust home, hard, all the way to the hilt. It felt insanely good, but then it got better as he plunged into her and she rocked with him, arching into him as the friction scoured her clit into an explosive climax. Her head dropped back and she howled.
Then he came, and she clenched him with all her muscles so that he hissed, his muscles rock hard. As they spiraled down, throbs echoing back and forth, she slipped down his length until her feet touched the floor, and they leaned together, breathless, only the wrinkled, sweat-damp apron between them.
Then she felt the vibration of his laughter as his chin rested on her head. “Think that’ll do it?” he asked.
“Oh. My. God,” she managed to say.
She brought her candles into the bedroom, and shut off all the other lights. They stumbled to the shower, and then to the bed. She glanced at the clock—no wonder she was so tired. That morning she’d slipped out of bed extra early to put together those blueberry muffins so he’d have a warm breakfast to wake up to. But though her body felt like polished silk ribbon, her mind was still wired. As they got under the cover, she said, “Will you sing to me?”
“I’m still finding your song,” he said, his smile surprisingly shy. “But I can give you some of my older songs. What do you want to hear?” He sat up on the bed, still shirtless, but he didn’t seem to mind the cold.
“Whatever you want to sing. I know I’ll like it.” She snuggled down under the covers, and he sang a long, slow song about a wolf chasing the moon across the hills, across a river, across the meadow, to the sea, where it beckoned on a road of light that the wolf could never reach.
It was sad and poignantly sweet, and her eyes were closing when he laid aside the guitar and slid into bed beside her. She wrapped her warm body around his cold one, and felt him relax into her with a quiet sigh.
She startled awake. “You’ll be here in the morning?”
“Do you want me to be here?”
“If you want to be here.”
“I want to be here,” he whispered into the curve of her neck.
“And I want you to be here,” she replied, then slid into sleep.
She dreamed.
Maybe it was the lonely wolf and the moon, maybe it was West looking at Kesley’s mural, but she was lost, trying to wade through rising streams, ducking past all the people she knew, including a stream of past lovers, as she searched an
d searched and . . .
“Hey, hey.”
She gulped, and woke, staring around wildly. She was in her room. Everything was quiet—the rain had stopped. That was it, the rain had stopped, and the light was dim from one last guttering candle. West’s arms held her tight, and she dug her fingers into his shoulder.
“It was just a dream,” he said. “I got you.”
McKenzi’s cat stirred inside her. “Don’t go.”
“I’m right here,” he whispered.
She flung her knee over him, put her head on his shoulder, and fell back to sleep.
This time her sleep was dreamless, and she woke abruptly four hours later. Though her family all had different sleep habits, it had long been a joke that McKenzi was the only cat-napper. She eased herself out of the covers, making certain no cold air got in underneath, and pulled on her bathrobe as she padded softly into the kitchen, where she spotted the apron on the floor. She picked it up, smiling with memory. Oh, yeah. The color was still toxic but she knew what she’d be thinking of every time she tied it on.
As she started toward the back door, she got an idea. She’d figured out that West only owned what he stood up in. As she picked up his things, his scent rose off them, making her toes curl. She loved his smell, masculine and musky. But maybe he’d like to wake up to warm, clean clothes.
One of the gifts Kesley’s Jameson had given her was a washer and dryer, set on the back porch between the cottages, on the other side of Kesley’s bathroom. McKenzi hopped out in the cold air, her breath clouding, and popped a load into the washer.
Before reentering her place, she glanced upward at the pure, rain-washed sky. Ordinarily that would have called for celebration, as she hated getting wet. But would clear weather make West push off?
She was aware as she moved back to her kitchen that all her usual rules had suspended, and she wondered if this weird sense of being poised between two roads, or choices, was why her cat had gone quiet inside her. It felt as if the entire world held its breath, waiting for . . . something.